Teachers working together to improve student achievement in reading and writing

December 07, 2007

Comments on Modeling

Meryem Kennedy sez...

Some people are born to party, like some of my students, but I was born to read. I read e-ve-ry-thing. I can't help it. If there is a print somewhere, I have to know what it says.

So in modeling, that is what I do. I share with them my reading
journey. I tell them I read every night instead of watching TV. I give
book talks and share with them my joy in reading. When we list our
books and how many pages we have read so far, some of them choose to
challenge how much I read and start competing with me.

It is fun to bring this part of me to class: I love to read. I tell and
show my students this passion I have for indulging in other worlds.
They see me read and they get it: It is not ABNORMAL for people to like
to read.

I model by being who I am: BORN TO READ!

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Steve Peha sez...

I agree with Meryem that the most satisfying part of this kind of teaching is that I get to be myself as a reader.

Many times I've come up with great lessons simply by looking at my own
reading, demonstrating it in front of the class, and then figuring out
how kids could apply what I had done to their own reading process. I
think of this as carrying the curriculum inside of me. As long as I
show up to class, my lesson ideas show up with me.

Mostly this means I have to model all the time. Modeling is the most
powerful form of teaching, I think. And I think it's especially
important in am area like reading where it's not always easy for kids
to understand what we want them to do.

The downside of modeling is that I think it takes a long time before we
can assess the effect we're having on kids. Reading skills develop
slowly, and many are very subtle. In today's world where we're often
encouraged to get into rapid cycles of
"teach-it-assess-it-teach-it-again", I think we lose sight of how
powerful modeling can be when it's done well day after day.